AN: I only just realised this chapter ends in the almost exact same way the previous one did xD. Oh well, I think it's pretty cool.


Chapter 12.

"What are you doing here?" Nessarose demanded, gripping the back of the chair in front of her so tightly her knuckles went white.

Elphaba stepped into the window sill and hopped down onto the floor, her broomstick in one hand and her black, pointed hat on top of her raven hair. "Such a warm welcome. It's good to see you, too, Nessa," she said sarcastically.

Nessarose narrowed her eyes. "You ruined my life."

"No," her sister corrected her sharply. "You did that all by yourself."

Nessa didn't say anything and Elphaba sighed, then took a step towards her sister.

"I didn't come here to fight, Nessa," she said. "I came to ask for your help."

"My help?" Nessa's voice rose a little in pitch and her eyes were wide with shock as she stared at the green woman in front of her incredulously. "You came to ask for my help? And what in Oz makes you think I would ever want to help you?"

Elphaba opened her mouth to speak, but Nessa was quicker. "You asked me for my help before," she pointed out, her voice shaking slightly. "I refused then. And now, after everything – after what you did to Boq…"

"All I did to Boq," Elphaba interrupted her, eyes flaming, "was attempting to save his life. It was you who nearly killed him with that spell, Nessa. I only did what I could."

"And transformed him into a man of tin," said Nessarose bitterly. "Bravo. Really. Amazing job, Elphaba. You didn't just ruin his life – you ruined mine as well. He left me, you know."

"I suspected he might," said Elphaba. "But that had nothing to do with me. He told you himself that he had been wanting to leave for a long time."

Nessa shook her head. "Never mind all that, Elphaba," she said, glaring at her sister. "Why are you here?"

"The Wizard is attacking an innocent kingdom," Elphaba said simply. "I need your help to stop him."

She quickly explained to her sister what was happening. When she finished, Nessa tapped her fingers against her leg, never taking her eyes off her sister's.

"So?" she said.

"So," Elphaba repeated, scowling, "I want you to call every Munchkin that's in that army back here. I want you to stop supporting the Wizard and preferably fight on our side instead."

"Why?" said Nessa flatly. "You abandoned me. You betrayed me. You took the man I love away from me. Why would I help you?"

"Because this is not about me," Elphaba said patiently, gritting her teeth. Sometimes her sister could be so infuriating! "This is about hundreds, maybe thousands, of innocent people getting hurt."

Nessarose turned around and walked to the door. "I don't care about innocent people."

"What?"

Nessa snorted. "I'm not like you, Elphaba," she said with a huff. "I don't care one little bit about a bunch of humans – or Animals, or animals – getting hurt. I don't even know them."

Elphaba stared at the retreating back of her sister, not quite believing what she was hearing.

"Is this really what you have become?" she demanded.

Nessarose stopped. "What?"

"This," said Elphaba. She took a step closer. "This spoilt, cold, bitter… witch!"

"Ha!" Nessarose turned around and fixed her sister with a death glare. "You call me a witch? You're one to talk! Don't forget, Elphaba, it's you everyone is hunting right now!"

"Just because most of the Ozians are more afraid of the Wicked Witch of the West," said Elphaba quietly, her dark eyes glowing, "does not mean they have forgotten about the Wicked Witch of the East, Nessa."

Nessa kept quiet.

"The woman who oppressed the Munchkins," Elphaba continued. "The woman who stripped them of their rights. I never meant to hurt anyone. You did. And I'm not saying that makes me any better than you are," she said before Nessa could say anything. "I've made mistakes. Big ones. I caused pain and suffering to those around me. But so did you, Nessarose. I'm no better than you are, but I'm no worse, either."

Nessarose still did not say anything and Elphaba shifted her weight to one foot, tilting her head a little to the side.

"What happened?" she asked softly. "What happened to you, Nessie? Where is the little girl I used to tell bedtime stories and build snowmen with in the winter? The girl I took care of all my life, the girl I comforted when she was sad or afraid, the girl I played games with and accompanied to university, where I watched you fall in love for the first time? What happened to us?"

"You left me," Nessa said bitterly. "That's what happened."

She looked up at the dark-haired witch, and Elphaba was a little startled to find her sister's eyes filled with tears.

"That girl," she said, her voice choked. "That girl you're talking about… you left her behind. You abandoned me, Elphaba. You abandoned me so that you could fly off and help a bunch of Animals you've never even met! All my life, you've been there for me… and then you suddenly weren't. You left me alone just like that. Do you have any idea how I felt?" She was crying now, crying and shouting at the same time. "Do you have any idea how much it hurt me when I found out that you had become a wanted fugitive? That you had left me without so much as saying goodbye?!"

Elphaba's heart ached for her sister. "Oh, Nessa…" She leant down to hug the younger girl, stroking her hair as Nessarose sobbed into her sister's shoulder.

"I never meant to," the green girl whispered. "I never meant to leave you, Nessie. I love you. And I felt so, so guilty – for leaving you, and Glinda… and Fiyero. But I had to. I'm sorry, but I just had to. Once I found out about the Wizard's true nature, about the fact that he was hurting and even killing Animals… I couldn't just sit back and do nothing, do you understand that? I had to try and help somehow, and this was the only way I knew how!"

"I… I just missed you… so much!" Nessa cried, nearly hiccupping with sobs, and Elphaba tried to comfort her.

"I missed you, too, Nessie." She hugged the girl tightly. "I'm so sorry."

Nessa sniffled and wiped her nose with her sleeve; and as Elphaba pulled away slightly to look at her, she did not see Nessarose Thropp, Governor of Munchkinland and Wicked Witch of the East. She just saw Nessa, little Nessie, the girl she had practically raised, the girl she had known all her life.

"You're wrong, you know," Nessa said, so softly that Elphaba almost didn't hear her.

Elphaba blinked. "About what?" she asked. Part of her feared that Nessa was only playing a trick on her and was about to betray her – she knew how manipulative her sister could be, and Nessa could hold a grudge for a long, long time.

"About…" Nessa sniffled again. "About what you said." She shook her head. "You are better than I am," she whispered. "You… you care. You always have. You care about so much, and you always try to help… I'm not like that, Elphaba. I'm selfish. I'm…" Tears started streaming down her face again. "I'm wicked."

"No, you're not," Elphaba said firmly. She hugged her sister. "Don't think like that, Nessa. You're the sweetest girl I've ever met."

"I've always looked up to you," Nessa said quietly. "I wish… I wish I had done so many things differently. Then maybe… maybe the people wouldn't hate me, and Boq wouldn't have left me…"

Elphaba brushed some hair away from the younger girl's face. "It's never too late to change, Nessie," she said gently.

Nessarose looked up at her.

Before she could say anything, however, a man made of tin suddenly walked into the room, his axe raised, ready to strike.

Nessa cried, "Boq!" and Elphaba took a quick step backwards, pulling Nessa with her.

"I knew it!" the tin man spat when he laid eyes on Elphaba. "I knew it was her voice I heard!"

"What are you doing here?" Nessa asked, panicking a little.

"I stayed close," he said curtly. "I saw her," he nodded at Elphaba, "landing nearby, and so I sneaked into the house." He raised his axe again. "Why are you here?" he demanded of Elphaba. "To try and finish me off? Or to ruin even more people's lives?"

"It wasn't like that!" Elphaba protested, but Boq did not even stop to listen. Instead, he suddenly lurched around Nessarose and slammed the axe down in Elphaba's direction. Nessa shrieked as Elphaba jumped aside just in time.

"Now, Boq," she said, circling the table in an attempt to avoid him as he did the same thing trying to get to her. "Can you at least give me the chance to explain without me having to worry about being split in two?"

"Never!" he shouted, lunging forward again. Elphaba recoiled.

"Boq, stop!" Nessa cried, running over to him and grabbing his arm in an attempt to stop him. "It wasn't Elphaba's fault! It was mine, okay? It was mine!"

He stopped and stared down at the smaller girl. "What?!"

Tears were running down Nessarose's face now. "It was me," she wept, burying her face in her hands and shaking her head. "I didn't want you to leave, so I took Elphaba's spell book and I cast a spell on you, only it went wrong… it shrunk your heart. You were dying, Boq!" She started crying even harder. "I panicked, and I begged Elphaba to help me, only the spells from the Grimmerie cannot be reversed and so she had to think of something else. She changed you into a tin man to save your life, Boq!"

He staggered backwards, a look of utter shock on his metal face. Elphaba shrank back into a corner and hugged herself as she watched him processing the news. Nessa was still crying, apologising and pleading with him to forgive her.

"Is… is that true?" Boq asked Elphaba, his voice hoarse.

She glanced at Nessa and nodded.

"Yes."

He slumped against the wall, breathing heavily. "But…"

"It wasn't Elphaba's fault, Boq," Nessarose said, wiping her tears away, but new ones just kept coming. "It was mine."

Boq narrowed his eyes at the younger girl.

"You ruined everything for me," he hissed. "For years already, you've been making my life miserable! Taking away my rights, forcing me to stay here with you and play your servant… and then turning me into this!" He indicated his tin body.

"I'm so sorry!" Nessa sobbed.

Boq looked about ready to attack the poor girl, so Elphaba swiftly intervened.

"Boq," she said.

He didn't even look at her.

"Boq!"

Now he glared at her. "What?"

She took a deep breath. "I can try to change you back," she blurted out. Then she cringed a little. She wasn't sure if that had been the wise thing to do. She could try, yes… but she had no idea if she could actually change him back or not. Maybe with Glinda and Elsa's help…

Boq immediately turned to face her, his eyes hopeful. "Really?"

"I can try," she stressed. "But I'm going to need Glinda's help, and my –" She almost said "and my sister's", but she realised this was not the time nor the place for this conversation. She didn't have the time to explain to Nessa right now that she was not Frexspar's daughter, but the Wizard's, and that she had another half-sister to top that all off – not to mention the fact that that half-sister was the rightful queen of Arendelle.

Or is she? Elphaba suddenly wondered. Was Elsa the rightful queen of Arendelle? Now that it turned out that the king wasn't her father… but then again, maybe the crown had been passed down to her from her mother's side. She'd have to ask the snow queen about that once.

She shook her head in an attempt to clear it and looked at Boq. "You'll have to come with me."

He spluttered. "Where? And how?" He nodded at her broom. "On that thing?"

Elphaba made a face – Boq's metal weight would most likely cause them both to crash within minutes, if she would be able to get the broom off the ground at all. "You'll have to travel to Arendelle by yourself," she decided. "I can't take you with me, and I can't walk all the way with you, either. There's no time. There's a war going on, after all."

She cocked her head a little to the side, looking at Nessarose. "What are you going to do now, Nessa?"

Nessa sniffled and wiped her nose with her sleeve, like she used to do when she was younger. "I'll help you," she said, her voice small and shaky. "I'll have the Munchkins retreat from the Wizard's army and join the army of Arendelle instead."

Elphaba smiled at her and leant down to hug her sister. "Thank you, Nessie."

"What about me?" Boq demanded.

Elphaba let go of Nessa and turned around. "You," she said, "like I said, will travel to Arendelle by yourself. I'll tell the soldiers to look out for you, so that they know you're not an enemy. After this whole mess is over – which will hopefully be soon – I'll try everything I can to change you back to your human form. Okay?"

"Okay," he agreed gruffly. "But you better try your hardest."

She glared at him and he swallowed any next words, merely turning around with a huff.

Elphaba smirked slightly, then turned to face the window. She nodded once and looked at Nessa.

"I'll be back," she said. "After this is over. I'll help you sort everything out."

Nessarose nodded, catching her sister's hand in her own and squeezing it. "Thank you, Elphaba."

"It's okay." Elphaba kissed the younger girl's forehead. "Everything will be okay."

With that, she flew out of the window.